"Is there any news from the Marshal's side?" he asked the Right General beside him.
The Right General said, "It is said that Marshal Xie has temporarily set up a military affairs department in Tianjing and is discussing war with the generals."
"What's there to discuss? It's obvious!" Shi Yang said with great dissatisfaction. "As expected, with that woman by his side, the Marshal has started indulging in personal matters again. What's more important than achieving merit and establishing a career now! What is the Marshal thinking?"
The woman he was referring to was naturally Si Xitong.
The Right General immediately broke out in a sweat and reminded the cannon: "Your Majesty, Princess Feng Ning is our true master, and these weapons were given to us by her free of charge."
"You should watch your words."
Shi Yang glared at him: "What do you know!"
As soon as he finished speaking, several smoke signals were lit over the border of Shi Kingdom. Soon, the Hai Kou army assembled, numbering five thousand, compared to the two thousand Xie Ming had encountered.
Shi Yang glanced at the scene from afar, and his expression immediately turned serious. Just as he turned his head, the Right General beside him was suddenly shot down.
The Right General instantly collapsed into a pool of blood.
"Hey!" Shi Yang immediately dropped to the ground. His heart skipped a beat; that bullet had been aimed at him.
He already knew that the Northern Xiongnu had something called a sniper rifle, but he didn't expect the Haikou to have one too. And they were at least two hundred paces away.
Soon, Shi Yang's 10,000-strong army assembled at the border was caught off guard by 5,000 sea monsters. Shi Yang hastily retreated, managing to save only 6,000 men. But his Pingcheng Pass was lost.
Upon arriving at the barbican, Shi Yang realized it wasn't safe either, so he immediately took three thousand men and left, leaving three thousand to guard it. He figured that setting up cannons on the walls should hold out for a while.
But to his utter surprise, less than a quarter of an hour after he left, the barbican was captured by five thousand sea monsters, and even the cannons on the city wall were blown to smithereens.
For the first time, he encountered a power even stronger than the Lord. And that power was still advancing.
While Shi Yang was terrified, one of his junior officers unexpectedly received a message: "Your Majesty, the one who occupied the barbican is a man from the Central Plains. He claims to be surnamed Mu and named Muye."
"He is a captain in the 1st Marine Regiment of the God Ass."
"He said that as long as you hand over the Shi Kingdom and become his master, he will stop the slaughter."
Shi Yang immediately spat out, "Pah, what utter garbage!"
"What other information did you find out?"
The young general said, "It seems that a large army is coming after them. There are a total of seven thousand people who have landed now."
What? Shi Yang was immediately terrified. With only seven thousand men, he had managed to cause his Shi Kingdom to lose two key cities, and the Yue Kingdom had even lost its capital.
It seems this force is not a disorganized mob but a regular army.
The information collected by the Shi Kingdom government was reported to the new Tianjing.
At this moment, in the Military Affairs Department of Shuntian Prefecture.
Xie Guang was inexplicably invited into the Military Affairs Department by the Xie family, where he stood in the most inconspicuous corner, quietly listening to the Xie family generals and the capital garrison generals arguing about the war situation.
In addition, messengers from various places would occasionally send battle reports.
Xie Lanzhi, seated at the head of the table, was looking through the envelope in her hand, her brows furrowed. After a while, she put the letter away and began to analyze Haikou's current weapons and strength.
With sniper scopes and cannons on board, it's a warship. Information about the warship is still unclear. It seems ordinary reconnaissance won't suffice. Currently, the entire Yue Kingdom, except for Jiguang Island and the delta, has been occupied. The Hai Koi are planning to establish a camp in Yue.
The coast of Yue is located in the South China Sea, making it arguably the maritime gateway to the Central Plains. It seems the enemy has occupied the border, and a large army is on its way to invade.
And the enemy's artillery fires even faster than the Type 94.
The Type 94 was already the shortest-barreled cannon. It could fire an average of three shots per minute. Although it had shown signs of decline on the northern front against the Xiongnu, the Type 94 cannon still held a numerical advantage. After all, firing it wasn't a big loss.
Xie Lanzhi then recalled Xiao Fenghuang mentioning that fifteen Changhong cannons had been deployed at Luerqu in the delta to block a large breach in the sea. Compared to its strategic importance, Shiguo Prefecture was not as crucial as the delta and Luerqu, yet the sea monsters did not attack those two places, but instead chose the more inland Shiguo Prefecture.
The other side seemed to be very familiar with the current military deployment situation in Luerqu and the Delta.
As expected, the sea monsters had planned the invasion in advance. They had also been gathering intelligence on the war situation in the Central Plains for quite some time.
The reason they dare to invade now is because they have a weapon advantage and the ability to strike first.
Xie Lanzhi thought for a moment and then offered the generals a new idea: "Fifteen Changhong cannons are deployed at both the Luerqu Canal and the Delta."
"We did not send Changhong cannons to the Yue Kingdom and the Shi Kingdom. But we were not unprepared."
The reason the Changhong Cannon cannot be deployed in Yue Kingdom for the time being is to prevent this powerful weapon from being captured and used against them. After all, there are considerable opposing forces in both Yue Kingdom and Shi Kingdom, but they have only been suppressed temporarily. Those who have submitted to the new Tianjing are merely a group of sycophants.
For example, the Yue general who led 20,000 troops to rebel was directly executed. Hai Kou wiped out this Yue force, completely shattering the illusions of those who wanted to surrender.
It seems that the naval forces disdain using foreign powers to stabilize the region; they are confident in invading the Yue Kingdom, or rather, they want to give it a taste of its power.
Xie Lanzhi added, "Now that Hai Kou has captured two city gates of Shi Guofu, he has not continued to advance. Instead, he has taken steps to persuade Shi Yang to surrender."
"This man from the Central Plains named Muye seems to be different from the other sea monsters."
The Xie generals all said, "Marshal, this man's crime of colluding with foreign tribes to attack the Central Plains is unforgivable."
"King Shi has not yet betrayed us; we need to send someone to support him immediately."
"The leader of the other force is named Scott, but there is currently no specific information about him. All that is known is that he is a pirate who is feared in the open sea."
Only two people spoke in unison: "Marshal, the defenses of Luerqu and the Delta need to be strengthened. If necessary, we should launch a surprise attack on Haikou from the Delta."
Because the delta was located to the right of the Yue Kingdom, and although the islands near the delta were scattered, the larger island was behind, making it a strategically advantageous location that was easy to defend and difficult to attack.
As long as the large island exists, the sea monster will never dare to take another step forward.
These words were spoken by Xie Shangguang and Xie Ying. The two attracted the attention of the older generals, who unanimously agreed. Rather than launching an attack from the land, it would be better to send troops directly from the delta.
Xie Lanzhi felt she had too little information, so on the military distribution map she had drawn, she moved a pebble one step ahead onto Aba Na.
"Let Xie Bing from Delta launch a counter-attack first, don't rush into an attack."
"Yes!" A general quickly left Shuntian Prefecture, mounted his horse, and went to report.
Xie Lanzhi glanced at the person squatting in the corner and said, "Xiang Guang, come here."
The military officers all looked at Xie Guang and made way for him. Xie Guang raised his finger and pointed to his face, seemingly incredulous: "They're calling me, no, calling me 'Little one'."
Xie Lanzhi said, "Get over here right now!"
Without wasting words, she pointed directly to an inconspicuous piece of land, an exclave between the Yue Kingdom and the Shi Kingdom. It consisted of only one lake, surrounded on three sides by mountains with sheer cliffs. It was infamous as a "man-eating valley."
Because there are many jackals, tigers, and leopards here at night, boats are prone to running aground here, so it is not easy for boats to come.
Xie Lanzhi chose this enclave because there was an ancient plank road built on the mountainside, so anyone who wanted to cross it could easily do so with just a little effort.
After crossing the plank road, one can enter the mountainous region of the Central Alliance. The Central Alliance has many inland ports, with the State of Lu being a prime example. With the spirit of the Long March, one can bypass the main port by land and launch a surprise attack on the Deer Canal from the mainland.
This is how the Northern Desert Army betrayed the Northern Hu and Xiongnu at Luerqu.
If this enclave is left unguarded and someone takes advantage of the situation, even if the delta and Luerqu are protected like an impregnable fortress at sea, they could still be stabbed in the back.
Moreover, the sea monsters also possessed repeating firearms.
Xie Lanzhi felt that a fully-fledged machine gun couldn't possibly appear so quickly, but this must be the precursor to the machine gun. The ability to fire five shots in rapid succession was a huge advantage in this backward era.
Xie Guang found himself assigned to a dilapidated enclave, but he had no objections. After all, he was just guarding a gate, and what difference did it make which gate it was?
Xie Lanzhi specially gave him a Changhong cannon. The generals felt that using a Changhong cannon with a range of two thousand meters to defend a dilapidated enclave was a bit of a waste of its talents.
However, the generals did not refute Xie Lanzhi's opinion.
Xie Guang was assigned 500 men and a Changhong cannon, and he set off immediately.
At the same time, Jianzhang Palace did not lag behind.
Civil officials, represented by Wu Qiu and Li Ling, were planning all sorts of projects.
Wei Zhao spoke first: "Our procurement of ores, steel, gunpowder, and other materials in various places has already been completed with the production lines arranged by Your Highness, and we have employed family members of craftsmen from the Ministry of Works. We can be deployed immediately upon Your Highness's order."
Wu Qiu said, "During the two months that Your Highness sent me to patrol the countryside, I have gained the trust of merchants in various places and collected one million taels of silver for the court by distributing red invitations to the merchants' associations."
Li Lingdao said, "Grain from various regions has been arranged from local granaries to the newly built national highway and is being rapidly dispatched to Weidu."
The other officials reported, "His Highness instructed us to shorten the strategic transport route, which has now been reduced by 30%. The waterway from Huayin Kingdom to Tianjing can now be completed in two days."
"The Central Alliance belongs to our shipyard, which has expanded to eight locations. In the past two years, we have built a total of thirty large treasure ships."
"Besides the large granaries, smaller granaries in various regions have been used as civilian grain reserves to withstand natural disasters. Each small granary currently holds 7,000 shi (a unit of dry measure) of grain. There are sweet potato granaries, peanut granaries..."
The agricultural official reported: "The greenhouse vegetable experiment was successful, and the batch of cabbages harvested in winter has already been distributed to various vegetable markets."
"Grain harvest has reached an innovative level this year, exceeding last year's 40 million shi by 10,000 shi. The total grain reserves are sufficient for five years."
An official from Mingsuanmen said, "The fruits and vegetables promoted by Daxiaocaikou have spread throughout the towns and cities, with monthly transactions reaching five thousand taels, and sometimes as much as eight thousand taels."
The five gatekeepers, led by Wei Gong, reported: "The production of Changhong cannons has reached ten per month, Type 94 cannons one hundred per month, and firearms seventy per month. Currently, there are 7,680 firearms in reserve. There are five hundred Type 94 cannons and a total of fifty Changhong cannons."
Faced with reports from officials, countless ministers discovered that their Great Jin Dynasty's firearms had developed to the point of numbering in the tens of thousands. Everyone felt extremely proud.
Si Xitong looked calmly at the ministers who were beaming with joy and proud of the strength of the Great Jin Dynasty.
She finally announced: "From this day forward, the new Tianjing is officially in a state of war preparedness! All officials in various regions shall remain at their posts and shall not leave without authorization."
"A curfew will also be imposed starting tonight, and the Southern Region and the Central Alliance will be subject to the same curfew."
"Anyone who dares to question this curfew and war preparedness will be executed without mercy if they disobey! As for me..." Si Xitong paused, raised her head, her deep eyes like black holes, absorbing all the cold light, making her appear imposing.
The ministers immediately straightened their backs and stood up straight, almost subconsciously adjusting their posture.
Si Xitong finally changed his tune openly and honestly, saying, "As if I were here in person!"
The ministers were stunned, and then, with one heart and one mind, they all knelt down and kowtowed, their morale soaring: "Long live the Emperor! Long live the Emperor! Long live the Emperor!"
"Long live the Emperor! Long live the Emperor! Long live the Emperor!!"
"Long live the Emperor! Long live the Emperor! Long live the Emperor!"
A note from the author:
Thank you to all the little angels who voted for me or watered my plants with nutrient solution between 2022-02-21 20:24:16 and 2022-02-22 20:44:51!
Thank you to the little angel who threw the landmine: I have a big dragon (1 dragon);
Thank you to the little angels who watered the nutrient solution: 10 bottles of "Inappropriate Words Everywhere"; 2 bottles of "Xin Xin";
Thank you so much for your support! I will continue to work hard!
Chapter 223 A Historical Turning Point Belonging to the Empress
The entire southern Central Plains was quickly mobilized. Most people were unaware of what was about to happen, only knowing that war had broken out again. Suddenly, the imperial court issued curfew orders to local officials, causing widespread panic among the populace. They thought that war was also brewing in Nanjing.